John Hambleton Holdcroft (1926-2014) – Hong Kong Harbour scene & HMS Tamar

John Hambleton Holdcroft’s (1926-2014) Hong Kong Harbour scene is perhaps interesting as, though painted in the twentieth century it is a representation of Victoria harbour in the nineteenth century. Similarly so with his image of HMS Tamar, which was gone by 1941. So I’m not sure when, or if, Holdcroft was in Hong Kong (he may have worked from photographs, other China School paintings) – if any has more information I’d love to know?

John Hambleton Holdcroft was born in Bristol, educated at the Bristol Cathedral School, war service with the Black Watch regiment and then returned to Bristol to study at The West England College of Art. He later spent time at the artists’ colony on the Channel Island of Sark (where Mervyn Peake was). He later worked with the Oslo Museum on producing a series of large pen drawings of the city and, in 1960 he returned to London to work for the advertising firm Mather & Crowther. In 1967 John moved to St Leonard’s to take up the post of Head of Graphic Design at Hastings College.